forever brothers
by purplepanda242
Summary: In which Katie interrupts a bonding moment. One-shot.


**Hallo!**

**I'm sorry if these characters are OCC. I just thought this would be a sweet story around Katie, Travis, and Connor... I hope you like it!**

**Again, feel free to review! :)**

**- purplepanda242**

The morning dew is still flecked all over the grass as Katie Gardner steps out of her cabin on her way to the strawberry fields. She flicks her tousled brown hair out of her green eyes as she treads lightly on the path. Although her boyfriend, Travis Stoll, is nowhere to be seen, she figures he'll turn up sooner or later. He always does. Not that she's arguing, of course. He's probably still sleeping even if sometimes he wakes up early to meet her down at the fields.

She hums a tune as she kneels down and tends to her strawberries. They're bright red, plump, and look deliciously inviting as the sun begins to make its way up the sky. She figures the Apollo kids will be up very soon as their dad makes his early morning rounds.

She smiles as she thinks its going to be a pretty good day.

* * *

The sun has been in the sky for a while now as Katie stops her work to look around. Usually, Travis would be here either sitting quietly under the big oak tree near where she normally worked or annoying slash talking to her. Today, it was completely silent and no cute, blue-eyed, curly-haired boy is taking liberty in watching his girlfriend tend to her strawberries. She frowns, but the breakfast conch blows, forcing Katie to turn from the Hermes cabin back to the strawberry fields where she yells, "Fall in!" and leads her cabin to the breakfast pavilion. She turns her head to the Hermes table on instinct and feels confused as she can't see Travis or his brother Connor anywhere. In fact, it's their second-in-command who's leading them in.

Miranda taps her shoulder and whispers, "Can you please move? I'm really hungry." Katie starts walking again when she realizes she's stopped in the middle of the pavilion and everyone is staring at her.

After breakfast, Katie directs Miranda to lead their cabin to their first activity as she searches for Travis and/or Connor. As if someone is directing her, Katie finds herself wandering into the woods and into a little clearing where she spots the two brothers spread out on a picnic blanket and looking up into the sky. She hesitates, then quickly darts behind a tree.

Travis and Connor are laughing at a story Travis just told and when their laughter dies down, Katie listens.

She hears the trees rustle in the wind for a moment before Connor's voice drifts over to her. "Thanks, Travis."

"For what?"

"For being my brother."

Katie dares to peek around the tree and sees Travis giving his brother a hug. "Of course. I'm always here, stupid. You know that."

Katie finds the seriousness rather uncharacteristic and she frowns. Neither Travis nor Connor are flashing a special Stoll grin and she thinks its un-natural. Not that she would ever admit it, but people do need their methods of cheering up and lifting the tension. Katie even finds herself looking at Travis whenever the mood becomes too somber. She needs their smiles.

"It's just that-" Connor's voice trails off.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"No, what?"

"It's nothing."

"Connor, I'm your brother. You can tell me anything."

Connor takes a breath and closes his eyes. "Don't get mad, okay?"

"Never."

"Well, I've been feeling kinda lonely lately. Listen, I think your relationship with Katie is amazing. Seriously. You guys are best friends and should've totally gotten together a long time ago. But sometimes I wake up and I find your bed empty or you bailing out when planning pranks and stuff, and those things get to me. That's _our_ thing. Especially after..." Katie thinks she hears her heart break as she listens Connor's voice crack at the end. Gods, she's been so self-absorbed. How could she have overlooked that?

"Oh, gods. Connor, no! I never meant for you to feel like that." Katie peeks around the tree again. Travis is sitting up and running a hand through his hair. "Connor, you're my baby brother. Why didn't you just _tell _me?"

"'Cause I know how much this relationship means to you and to Katie! I couldn't just dump my problems on you."

Travis lets out a frustrated sigh. "Connor, you can tell me _anything_." He silently berates himself for not being a better brother.

A silence hangs over the clearing.

"Travis?"

"Yeah."

"Why did Mom have to die?" Connor's voice is very, very small.

Katie's body goes very still. _Mrs. Stoll died?_

Travis sighs. "Because you and I both know that even though she was the best mom ever, she didn't make good decisions." He glances over at Connor and then pulls him into a hug. Even though Travis is sixteen and Connor is fourteen, they both cling to each other the same way the clung to each other so many years ago after experiencing a drunken-mother episode.

"Like drunk ones," Connor mumbles.

"Yeah. Like drunk ones."

Another silence hangs over the clearing. Connor murmurs something to Travis, who chuckles, then says, "Katie, you can come out, y'know."

Katie blushes strawberry red as she steps out behind the tree. "How did you-"

"We're children of Hermes. We're literally born to sneak around whereas you... aren't."

"Thanks so much." Katie takes a seat next to Travis' head and runs one hand through his hair. He closes his eyes. "Sorry for spying."

Travis shrugs as well as he could laying down. "S'okay. I was going to tell you sooner or later."

After a while, Katie says, "I didn't know Mrs. Stoll died."

"We got the letter today. Turns out she was drinking and driving." Connor's voice is hard, but a sliver of sadness slips in. Katie gives Connor's hand a squeeze, then slips her hand in Travis', lacing their fingers together.

"I'm sorry."

"It's not your fault," Travis replies with his eyes still closed.

Katie sighs and then says, "I'm also sorry about the stealing away Travis thing, Connor."

Connor shifts his eyes from the blue sky to Katie. "S'okay."

But Katie has an urge to argue. "No, it's not, because you guys were brothers first and... and... I didn't even _know_ and all those times Travis came to see me I didn't even think that... gods, I shouldn't even be here right now! Your mom just died, and..." Katie pulls her hand away from Travis' hair and slips her hand out of his. His eyes look up at her. "I should get going... I'm sorry, I'll just leave you-" She gets up to leave but surprisingly, it's Connor who pulls her back down next to Travis.

"Katie. It's totally fine. I get it, you're Travis' girlfriend and you guys are, y'know, together."

"But-"

Travis sits up and cups her chin with his hands. His blue eyes hold hers and Katie doesn't even know she's crying until he brushes the pads of his thumbs over her cheeks and pulls her close. She wraps her arms around his torso.

"I'm sorry, guys," she sniffles against Travis' chest. "I don't even know why I'm crying."

"Katie. Listen to me." Connor rubs Katie's back, looking at Travis. "It's okay. I'm okay. We just needed some time."

"Yeah." Katie smiles a watery smile and then gets up to truly leave. "I totally get it. Talk. Be brothers. Mourn for your mother, who had a beautiful and kind soul, even if she spent it doing stupid things. Spend the whole day, heck, spend the week. I promise I won't get in the way."

"Thanks, Katie." Travis pulls her down for a kiss and then lets her go. "I'll make it up to you next week?"

"No need." She gives him one last kiss on the cheek. "Seriously. If I catch you doing something nice for me because of this, I'll maim you."

Travis gives a little laugh and as Katie's walking away, he turns to Connor, who looks happier than he has in the past several weeks. "So, Connor. What do you say? You think camp had enough dark days?"

The last thing Katie hears is Connor's snort. "Not even close."

(Later, as she's watching the Athena cabin scream bloody murder at the fake Halloween spiders the Stoll brothers set up in their cabin, she thinks the day didn't turn out so bad after all.)


End file.
